It took rescuers 10 helicopter trips and about seven hours to airlift over 60 people from the flooding in Bugaboo Provincial Park on Sunday.
Jordy Shepherd, a team member with Columbia Valley Search and Rescue, said they were first called to the popular park in the East Kootenay region around 8 a.m. local time on Aug. 17.
He said the Alpine Club of Canada had informed rescuers that the creek levels were very high around the popular Conrad Kain Hut area, and that they should investigate.
What rescuers discovered was the creek near the hut, and under a trail bridge, was running very fast, and the water was dirty — and about 60 hikers and campers in the area would have faced a dangerous trek out if help hadn’t arrived.
“It’s quite fortunate that the road out, the logging road, was not compromised by this higher water,” Shepherd told CBC News.
“That would have been another problem, if all the vehicles were also stuck on the wrong side of a washout.”
As soon as rescuers realized that the hikers and campers were stranded, they set up a staging area and flew them out, after which they were taken to the trailhead to retrieve their vehicles.
Shepherd said the stranded guests ranged from 10 years old all the way to about 70 years of age.
“It took about seven hours total from when we were called to when we had everybody out,” he said. “And we also did another flight out to a campground that’s outside the park, in a further remote area.”
The rescuer said that a tarn — a mountain lake in the park, which has historically been popular for its rugged climbs and landscapes — had cut a channel and caused the flooding.
“We noted that the upper tarn, below Bugaboo and Crescent Spires, had cut a deep channel through the glacier ice that has historically held back the tarn on that side,” Shepherd told CBC News.
“So the tarn was actually flowing out the opposite side that it normally flows out.”
Shephed commended the rescuers for the operation, which he said was staffed entirely by volunteers, and he was glad that campers didn’t have to stay up overnight or try to brave the creek on their own.
The park has much of its core area closed indefinitely, while B.C. Parks staff investigate the extent of the flooding damage.
